bigglesfandomcom-20200215-history
Lavinsky
In Biggles Breaks the Silence, Lavinsky was a seal poacher who was the chief adversary for Biggles in his bid to recover the gold from the wreckage of the Starry Crown in Antarctica. Shortly after the end of the World War Two, Lavinsky was in Hong Kong looking to outfit his ship Svelt for a seal poaching expedition with his Japanese partners Shim and Sham. Needing a man to navigate his ship, Lavinsky approached Captain "Jumbo" Grimes and told him a story about the ship having been sold to the Chilean government and needing to be delivered to Santiago. Looking for a passage to England, Captain Grimes signed on without knowing the true purpose of the voyage. Nearing South America, Lavinsky ordered Grimes to turn for Graham Land in Antarctica which Grimes did under protest and the crew then commenced seal poaching. It was during this time that the ship sighted a hulk trapped in the pack ice which turned out to be an old schooner, the Starry Crown, which was reputed to be carrying a load of bar gold. However the Svelt was itself in difficulties with the ice closing on so Lavinsky ordered the ship turned north hastily, leaving behind a seaman named Larsen who had been sent ashore on an errand. Lavinsky then told Grimes to make for Hong Kong. Nearing harbour, the crew turned on Captain Grimes and the Chief Engineer Neil McArthur, fearing that they knew too much. Grimes had anticipated this and escape but McArthur was murdered. Subsequently Lavinsky returned to Antarctica in the Svelt to recover the gold. There he encountered Biggles and co. who had gone there on the same mission after Captain Grimes had related his account of the sighting of the Starry Crown to the British authorities. Lavinsky made several attempts on the gold but was frustrated because Biggles and his party had moved the gold from the hulk. The ice on which the gold was piled later broke off and drifted away and it was Biggles' party which found the moving ice floe first. Towards the end of the book, Lavinsky, in a last ditch effort to seize the gold, launched an all out armed assault on Biggles' camp but his men were finally driven off by the arrival of Algy in the reserve aircraft carrying a detachment of Royal Navy seamen. In Lavinsky's eagerness to go after the gold, he had neglected to look to his ship, which became trapped by ice. Biggles reported this to the authorities in the Falklands but efforts to rescue them were frustrated by severe gales and the crew of the Svelt were forced to spend an Antarctic winter on board. When a ship reached them in the spring, Lavinsky was not among the survivors. According to one member of the crew, Lavinsky had become brutal during the period of confinement and some seamen had conspired to put him off the ship. There was a fight which resulted in Lavinsky and his confederates being shot. Category:People Category:Biggles characters Category:Air Police era characters